(please to excuse this long-ish explanation, but read it)You may or may not know that last November I signed up to workout at a local gym with a personal trainer, three times a week. My first trainer was a girl who I'll call . . . Jamilla. Jamilla is a pretty girl with a very nice body. As a female, I was hopeful that she'd be sensitive to my specific weight loss goals. Turns out, not-so-much. She kept saying how "This exercise will really help with what all females need work on, losing weight on the booty." Um. Again, you may or may not know that I am booty-less. Serio. I have puh-LENTY of weight to lose elsewhere, but my buns are just flat. Nothin' there. Plus, my kiddos were in the facility's daycare, and not doing well, and when I'd get paged to help my kids, Jamilla was not very compassionate ("They're fine, the workers in there can take care of them," or with a roll of her eyes, "Do they ALWAYS need you?"). Oh, Jamilla! (PS, stop whining to me about how "bad" you are because you didn't work out yesterday and now you can feel yourself gaining more weight -- I weigh double what you do and I don't want to hear it.) After a weeeeeeird experience where I was told that Jamilla had to jet off "to South America this morning for an emergency for an undetermined amount of time, and sorry she didn't call you to cancel your appointments" but then was at the gym two days later with no explanation, I asked for a different trainer. That's when I got Andy (which may or may not be his name, and it's actually his name), who said exactly 17 words the entire 4 months we worked together, and he was always watching himself in the mirrors and flexing. On the day that he just took off (yes, he just left, didn't say a word to indicate that he'd be doing so), I was told that I'd be assigned to John.

Finally.

I don't know that I can adequately explain how awesome John is. He does so, so much more than just tell me how much to bench-press, or how many crunches to do. I have never felt judged or that I was inconveniencing him (which is great since, you know, it's his job) -- it's clear that he loves what he does. He didn't just ask me to write down what I eat and then tell me everything I was doing wrong, he talks WITH me about what I should be eating, WHEN, and WHY. He showed me his Ten Rules (oh, you'll LOVE the Ten Rules!), and is always telling me about articles that he's read about This New Technique or That New Diet (and then explains to me what's good and/or bad about those New Things). John's always looking for ways to improve the effectiveness of workouts -- he even initiated changing my workout sessions from 30 to 60 minutes, and it has made SO MUCH of a difference. He also understands the importance of resting, taking an entire session right before my first triathlon to show me some stretches and self-massage techniques that can (and did) help me, as well as go over what should be consumed right before and during the race. And, he's NICE. (Just don't ask him to count how many reps you've done because he's not counting.) (Just kidding, John.) (No, I'm not kidding.) Please check out his website, Do Performance and Fitness.

One of John's Ten Rules is that, regarding diet, The Rules don't apply 10% of the time. So, for my 10%, I make it count: no generic cookies cross my lips, no no, I only have the best. That's right, I go to The Sweet Tooth Fairy Bake Shop. (But you probably already know this about me.) Their Cake Bites (which were featured on Rachael Ray) are heaven in your mouth. The Wonderbars are my favorite today, but the Red Velvet cupcake will do in a pinch.

Now for the giveaway:

The winner will receive the following:~ If you're local to John, you'll receive Three 1-hour personal training sessions. Those not along the Wasatch Front, have no fear, for you can also benefit from this giveaway: If you're not local, you will be the recipient of online training with John for workout analysis and/or nutrition counseling.~a $30 Gift Card to The Sweet Tooth Fairy Bake Shop

YOU CAN ENTER UP TO SEVENTEEN* TIMES AND IT'S SUPER EASY. Here's how you win (yes, I totally bogarted this format from giveawaytoday):

Fourth Entry: Comment with your nameand then blog (facebook, twitter) about this post.*Example: Joe Blow. Twitter.(*technically, you could blog about itAND tweet about it AND fb it,and that would be, um, let's see...math's hard...NINE entries instead of three??But you'd have to come back each timeand tell me that you did so.)

Fifth Entry (worth 5 entries): Comment with your name

and tell me that you've added my blog button to your blog.

Example: Joe Blow. Button.

This giveaway will be open until Monday, July 6th, 2009, at 11:59 pm MDT. The winner will be announced here on this blog on Tuesday, July 7th, 2009.

I want you to know I had to psych myself up before I could enter. I'm serious about wanting (needing) to win this giveaway (the training, not the cupcakes). There is no point starting unless I'm serious about finding balance again.

Sharon Kyzer I LOVE the Sweet Tooth Fairy cupcakes, brownies and cake bites. I haven't tried all the cupcake flavors so that is something I want to do and then the english toffee and chocolate covered pretzels sound yummy